Florida’s next multi-billion dollar plan
A “historic” investment in Everglades restoration and state water resources, new protections for coral reefs to help protect against hurricane storm surge, more money for land acquisition and septic to sewer conversions, plus the rapid growth of electric vehicles in Florida. It’s all in this week’s Environment & Engineering Digest.
Protecting Natural Resources: The Governor has laid out his hearty $3.5 billion plan for protecting the environment and water quality over the next four years. The legislative proposal, which will be quarterbacked by the Department of Environmental Protection (DEP) includes ongoing Everglades restoration and various water quality and supply programs, including the Indian River Lagoon. Other particulars include expanding the existing Wastewater Grant Program by broadening project eligibility to address impacts to water quality from nonpoint sources such as stormwater and agricultural runoff. Also included is requiring that all wastewater facilities that discharge to waterbodies with a basin management plan area and aren’t attaining water quality standards upgrade to advanced treatment methods by 2033. The funding would also be used to continue the red tide emergency grant program and create a similar blue-green algae grant program to support state and local government response efforts. The Governor’s proposal would build on the previous $3.3 billion in investments over the past four years. Everglades Trust CEO Anna Upton called the latest plan “unquestionably historic.”
Some of the funding would establish a Coral Reef Restoration and Recovery Initiative “to increase the state’s coral propagation and deployment capacity to restore the natural infrastructure that will enhance coastal flood and storm surge protections,” according to the plan.
Florida Wildlife Corridor: Part of the natural resources plan above includes funding for the 2021 Florida Wildlife Corridor Act, a $300 million annual investment to connect 18 million acres of land stretching from the Keys to the Panhandle. Last week, the Governor and Cabinet approved spending $17.8 million in conservation easements to put two properties into land conservation in perpetuity to prevent future development, while allowing existing ranching operations to continue on the properties. In all, about 8 million more acres need to be secured through the Act, which is expected to cost upwards of $6 billion and take at least 20 years to complete.
Electric Vehicles: While electric vehicles (EV) represent just 1% of total vehicle registrations in Florida, there’s been an 87% increase in EV registrations over the past 15 months, something that state transportation planners are following closely. Trey Tillander, who heads the Florida Department of Transportation’s technologies section told a state senate committee last week that EVs could account for between 10%-35% of all vehicles on Florida roads by 2040. FDOT is in the process of building more charging stations with $198 million from the federal government, part of a national $5 billion EV fund for state DOTs. You can read more in this Florida Politics article.
LMA Newsletter of 1-23-23
